Not Just A Hat Rack

Something other than soccer tomorrow, promise!

Busy, busy morning.

Off to run a half marathon or so... just a training run. Did about 16 on Sand Flats Road in Moab last weekend... Ogden is approaching soon!

Here's a link to my story this week on USSoccerPlayers.com naming MLS teams: Sounders Already Scoring,

Here's a link to my story this morning in the Salt Lake Tribune about DC United, the most prolific team in MLS history when it comes to international play.

Finally, I write about the Earthquakes return to the Bay Area for the Reno Gazette Journal.

But this big news overnight is the departure of John Guppy, general manager at the Chicago Fire. I saw him just last week when the Fire was in town, and we talked about the rigors of the job and how much it can suck the life out of you. Considering his close ties to Philadelphia president Nick Sakiewicz, I wonder if he'll resurface there - or at Red Bull, whose president resigned this week as well. Guppy has deep ties to the NY/NJ area, and wasn't a great match for Chicago in my opinion. I wish him well - we'll hear from him soon enough. John, if you read this, take some time off and appreciate your family. It worked wonders for me 11 1/2 months ago!

Another column & misc.

You can read my 500-ish words on RSL's interminable preseason. It appeared in today's Sunday Salt Lake Tribune.

This and That...

Sir Edmund Hillary passed away yesterday. Ironically, I was working on a 2008 trekking preview for Snow Lion, including an ascent up the "Hillary Route" to Everest Base Camp, when I learned the news. It's safe to say that the company, and the Himalayan trekking industry, would not exist, at least in their present form, if it were not for the gentle 6'5" beekeeper whose humanitarian work on behalf of the Sherpas is immeasurable. "Nothing Venture, Nothing Win" was the book-length biography I read as a teenager and has inspired me to back down from no challenge ever since.

The current issue of Runner's World has a gripping series of stories on the 2007 Chicago and New York Marathons. Two of the largest races in the country, both were marked by tragedy. The magazine took a Newsweek style approach to understanding the factors that led to the cancellation of the Chicago race several hours in, due to extreme heat conditions. Then, editor Amby Burfoot spent several days following up on the death of U.S. marathoning star Ryan Shay at the Olympic Trials in New York City. Good stuff, whether you run or not. Speaking of running, it's Disney Marathon weekend in Orlando. Mrs. 'Hat Rack is going after another personal first. She'll run the Half Marathon on Saturday and the Full Marathon on Sunday (that's 39.3 miles in all) - all in pursuit of a medal shaped liked Goofy. That is goofy. But we love her!

Kevin Sites' In the Hot Zone is worth a read, folks. And not just because we both graduated from Medill, Northwestern's journalism school! He visited 20+ war zones in one calendar year including the obvious ones, Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, etc. He also checked in on the Maoist insurgency in Nepal, the tenuous ceasefire in Congo, monks vs the military in Burma/Myanmar, the aftermath of war in Vietnam and Laos, etc. I'm in awe of his dedication to shed light (and hope) on some of the most depressing examples of humankind's dark side. I think I'd have post-traumatic stress disorder. I bought it in the Fall, which makes it's references to events from last July all the more remarkable. You don't get much more current than this in a widely published book these days!

I talked to RSL GM Garth Lagerwey this week in anticipation of my next Salt Lake Tribune column next week, which will be on the MLS SuperDraft... He should be in Florida by now at the Player Combine. Knowing the pressures of the chair in which he sits, its challenges, and the passion that you have to bring to it, I'm rooting for him.

I'm also rooting for the Red Rocks. Utah's nationally ranked women's gymnastics team takes on nemesis and defending NCAA champion Georgia tonight at Huntsman Center. I won't make it, but if you're in the neighborhood and have never attended a meet, don't miss it! Arrive early - this one might sell out. (That's right, 16,000 people at a gymnastics meet. Gotta love it!)

Medill Degree Finally Pays

Seventeen and one-half years ago, I earned my diploma in journalism (which I have since lost, I regretfully admit) from Northwestern University.

My column in today's Salt Lake Tribune is my first column in a daily newspaper since graduation. I've been published in several regional magazines, one national one, game programs, media guides and a handful of websites. But as a classically trained PRINT journalist, I always found the daily newsprint compendium of news, opinion and advertising as the top of the journalism heirarchy.

Although the perception and readership of newspapers has dropped precipitously since I entered journalism school, millions of Americans and billions across the world still dispense a few pennies every single day to follow their favorite sports team, keep their government honest or gather insight into a world far beyond the realm of their commute to work. Others just read the comics, do the crossword puzzle or scan for $0.99/lb. chicken. Fair enough.

My parents have encouraged my desire to think and write freely from the beginning (and paid for a substantial portion of my degree) - and for that I am truly grateful. Mrs. 'Hat Rack encouraged me to start this blog more than a year ago and experience of writing several times a week has been prodigiously important to the honing of this craft. Thanks to you too - and know that I've just scratched the surface of what I want to put on paper.

You can see the journalistic fruits of my peers every day as they report on steroid scandals (Mark Fainaru), the Big Ten Network (anchor Dave Revsine), everything sports related (Mike Greenberg at ESPN Radio), various sports beats (J.A. Adance / LA Times, Victor Chi/formerly of San Jose Mercury News) - and even a few who don't write sports (editors in St. Petersburg, Fla., Chicago)... They have all provided inspiration, unbeknownst to them.

I expect my second Tribune column will focus on the MLS SuperDraft (Jan. 18) - until then, thanks again to each of you who reads me, online or on paper.

Remembering David Halberstam

A friend passed along the following tribute to Pulitzer Prize winning writer David Halberstam, who died earlier recently in a car accident. I haven't read nearly enough Halberstam, but I'm sure Grandpa 'Hat Rack has read virtually everything he wrote. You might recognize his incendiary book on the Vietnam War The Best and the Brightest, his compelling analysis of U.S media giants The Powers that Be or his recent classic War in a Time of Peace: Bush, Clinton & the Generals. In this household, his sports history titles resonate. The Teammates, (about Red Sox teammates Johnny Pesky, Dom Dimaggio and Ted Williams), Summer of '49 (Red Sox vs Yankees) and October '64 (Yankees vs Cardinals) are three of his best-known baseball works, but he also wrote about the NBA, NFL, Olympic sports and more.

Thanks to Medill grad Matt Baron for sending this along. Read Matt's parenting blog Chicago Parent

But I've buried the lead too far. So, without further introduction, here's a recollection of David Halberstam by Michael Capuzzo, published in The Miami Herald. (Thanks, Matt!)

Mentor's gone; but I hear him more clearly now

I was a 23-year-old writer living in Key West in the long shadow of Hemingway, reporting for The Miami Herald from a small stucco building a block from the beach on the Atlantic side of the island. David Halberstam told me more than once that winter, ``This is the best job you'll ever have.''

He was right, of course. He was right about many things he tried to show me that winter when he became my mentor, right about so much I didn't grasp.

Bagnato Byline Brings Back Bygone Memories

      Boise State’s improbable, never-say-die, underdog victory over Oklahoma has been amply dissected and disseminated by scores of sportswriters.  As much as I enjoyed the game as a fan, there is nothing I can add to this “Instant Classic.”  However, one game story leaped out at me above all others.  The byline of the AP game story the morning after spoke to me like the first day of journalism school.

             I remember the bitter cold of the 50-yard walk from my dorm door to Fisk Hall’s stately entrance.  It was the first week of classes in January 1987 and as an 18-year-old freshman I met my first journalism lab instructor: young, dashing, funny Andy Bagnato.  He was only two years removed from his student days at the Daily Northwestern when he returned to campus to teach a lab for Professor Roger Boye’s Basic Writing 101. 

In one of our first classes,